How quickly does bitterness dissipate?

[iandiggs]

Fermentation of my malty ale has more-or-less finished - added yeast on friday and had mega krausen but i just had a bit of a taste and it is a little bitter (think i steeped too long - although that shouldn't add bitterness, should it?) I've heard that it will wear off after a while. Is there anything i can do to hasten this?

[Rowang]

It will wear off.

Half of the bitterness you are tasting is the bitterness of the yeast still in suspension,which will disappear as soon as your beer is bright.

What was your hopping schedule?

Generally a longer steep wont contribute to bitterness. The bittering hops go in early!

[iandiggs]

T hanks Rowang. I gave First Wort Hopping a try as i really like hoppiness; i i put some cascade in while the wort was heating up for the boil after the sparge. Then i boiled for an hour with first gold and cascade and goldings for 10 mins and 0 mins before boil end. I did steep with cascade and goldings for quite long (possibly 2 1/2 hours while i was out down the pub-probably too long).
I was going to dry hop also but was discouraged by the bitterness of the wort at the mo - though, again, dry-hopping should only impart aroma, shouldn't it?
thanks for your help on this

[critch]

you will get bitterness at high steep temps for long times, not as much as an active boil obviously though

one of my comercial beers has an official bitterness of 8ibu's but because i totally hop bomb it and steep for over an hour it has a profound hoppiness and an actual ibu of 22 when i got it analysed

[iandiggs]

isn't that too bitter?

[haz66]

Thats not too bitter depending on the OG of the beer but i`m guessing Critch wont be brewing 2% ABV beer, bitterness is relative to the OG of the beer,
if i`m brewing beers of around OG1035 to OG1040 then i tend to go for an IBU of around 30 ish apart from my blonde beer which is down at around 22IBU but lots
of late hops for a big flavour.

[Rookie]

It's hard to give an exact timeline on this, there are so many factors that can effect it.
Several years ago I entered a British barleywine in a local compitition and scored mid 30s and 13th place (judge said. "Too hoppy for style"). The next year I entered another bottle from that batch and scored in the low 40s which got me second place.